Keep Defending

A 2 level demo for Keep Defending is now available for those who would like to try the game without parting with hard-earned cash!

The levels included in the demo include scene 1 in the main game called "Homestead", which acts as an introduction to Keep Defending's gameplay mechanics.

Once you've learnt the basics, have a go at scene 4 called "Highguard" where you have Wizards, Crossbows, and Knights to place in your defenses and help you try to repel the enemy over two stages (day and night).

You can also select between 4 difficulty levels which increase the number of enemies as you progress from Easy all the way to Insane. More enemies allows for higher scores, so you'll need to ramp up the difficulty to get better scores.

And talking of scores, there are Steam Leaderboards setup in the demo for the Homestead and Highguard scenes for you to conquer, although please note these leaderboards are for the demo only and aren't shared with the leaderboards in the main game.

For those who enjoy the demo, please take a look at the full game which features an additional 8 scenes to play (to make 10 in all) with different level types (Ambush and Advance modes as well as Gate Defense) and many more allied units to deploy (Soul Collectors, Cannons, and even Exploding Sheep!). There are also Steam Achievements to chase.

Can you complete all 10 levels in the full game? I hope the demo gives you enough of a taster to want to try!

Please leave any comments regarding the demo or the full game in the discussions, and thanks for reading! :)

The v1.10 update for Keep Defending contains some refinements to the game that improve the integration of Steam leaderboards on the level selection scene, as well as improvements to the hint/tutorial messages that are displayed in the game.

There's also a "Call to Arms" note at the bottom of this announcment (please read):

Leaderboard stability fixes

There are occasions when loading the level selection scene (usually when the game is first started) that the level leaderboards fail to load correctly or completely.

I've made some changes to the logic handling this in the background and this should hopefully be much more reliable (and efficient) than before, and better suited for handling potential edge cases.

Revised hint messages

Rather than showing hint (help) messages to the player as text locked to the player's viewpoint, I've transferred the majority of them to in-game objects which makes them easier to read, ensures they're always available, and is much less annoying (well, for me at least!).

There's a new banner positioned behind you in the level selection scene that contains a list of instructions for new players (replacing all of the hint messages shown in the level selection scene).

There's also a new level intro panel implemented which replaces the previous level name/info and "Shoot arrow to start" texts that were previously locked to the player's viewpoint.

There are still a few of the old hint messages remaining to remind players what they need to do next, but as a whole the hint messages are much less visible in the game.

Other changes

- I've removed the ambient sound effect for soul orbs as they were overbearing the other game effects (especially in levels where multiple orbs may be rising at any given time).- Improved the logic controlling how the Main Campaign Completed achievement is unlocked.- I've also unlocked the Early Access achievement for players that can complete all other achievements first (so they can register 100% achievements for the game, even though they didn't take part in Early Access).- The Unity version has been updated to the latest release in its branch (5.5).

Call to Arms - The quest for a Steam rating

In a bid to try and get the game a Steam rating score I would like to request as many players as possible to please leave a review for the game in Steam as it still hasn't reached the goal of 10 (Steam purchased) reviews a couple of months after release!

I genuinely hope everyone has enjoyed playing the game and it's great to see so many scores registered in the leaderboards for each of the 10 levels available. However, very few people are leaving reviews so Keep Defending is receiving zero exposure on Steam.

If you've experienced problems with the game, or simply don't like it - please let me know in the discussion groups and I'll try to remedy whatever the issue may be.

Otherwise please help support the game (and its developer!) by taking a minute to post a review and hopefully we can get Keep Defending an official Steam rating!

Thanks for reading and of course supporting and playing Keep Defending!

This v1.09 update for Keep Defending includes some changes to Eagle Heights to make this level easier for newcomers. There are also some extra optimizations that will make a difference to owners of both lower powered VR configurations (minimum spec) and higher powered configs (recommended spec+).

Eagle Heights Changes

After watching a number of playthroughs where players are trying to get to grips with Eagle Heights I've made a couple of small changes which I hope improves the level's accessibility for all:

1) The player now starts with 50 gold on this level which means they can immediately afford and purchase a Teleport for placing in one of the portals available around the level.2) I've implemented an additional hint message which appears for a few seconds (and then disappears automatically) when the player's gold reaches 250. The hint message is a reminder to buy defenses to help against the enemies.

The playthroughs I watched involved new players skipping the Homestead tutorial level and going straight to Eagle Heights. They were then quickly overwhelmed due to the long distance shooting required to hit enemies (until you earn enough to buy a teleport). Because Homestead was skipped they were also unfamiliar with buying defenses to help out.

I originally designed Eagle Heights as an exercise for players to see the value of teleports and extra defenses (crossbows for this level) as it is impossible to complete by yourself from the start position, and much, much, easier when you can teleport around and have allies aiding you.

I hope these small adjustments change an initially daunting level into one where new players are able to complete it much more easily.

Optimizations

After watching another player with less than minimum spec hardware trying to play the game (which was painful as the player's bow aiming was lagging badly due to the inadequate CPU in his rig), I have taken another look at some of the mechanics in the game in a quest for further optimizations.

Fortunately I found a number of areas where improvements could be made (a couple of them significant) which I've implemented accordingly.

For lower end hardware the result is a much smoother experience versus previous versions as the overall performance requirements are now lower. I've also managed to smooth out some of the more taxing effects in the game so they have less of an impact on framerate when they occur (e.g. when an enemy transforms into a Soul Orb was a real framerate killer on lower-end hardware).

The optimizations obviously benefit everyone whatever your hardware, but the wins are much more obvious if your setup was at the minimum end of the hardware requirements. However, owners of recommended spec hardware (or higher) could try playing at Hard or even Insane difficulty levels which significantly increase the number of enemies you face!

Note that I'm not lowering the minimum spec required for playing the game as it is actually still very demanding on CPU and GPU power. When playing the later levels, you can find yourself battling with dozens and dozens of enemies in play at once. Factor that with up to 32 allies helping you, and all the resulting projectiles and pyrotechnics, and the minimum spec is unfortunately something that can't be compromised on.

However, if you do have low end hardware, then you can still play Keep Defending but I'd recommend looking at the in-game video settings and dropping the Sampling from the default 1.0 value to say 0.9 (or even lower). Disabling the "Additional FX" option would also help (as this limits the number of lights in a scene as well as the intensity of any Weather FX).

Thanks for reading and of course supporting and playing Keep Defending!

The v1.08 update for Keep Defending features optimizations for the game as well as a new control option for rotating on the spot (Rift users only).

The exploding sheep now have a limited lifespan following detonation so the level is no longer overrun by them (which unfortunately tends to slow down gameplay on the larger levels).

Staying with the sheep, the explosion effects when they detonate are now much more efficient and no longer hitch/pause the gameplay briefly when multiple sheep (in close proximity) explode at once.

The bonfires seen on Eagle Heights, The (Small) Wall, and King's Ending are now more efficient so performance on those levels will have improved slightly.

For Oculus Rift (+ Touch) users I've introduced a new setting in the options menu named "Use Thumbstick To Rotate". When this option is enabled you must press the thumbstick (on either controller) left or right to rotate your view left or right (in 90 degree steps). This is instead of using the grip buttons which some players may press accidentally. Note that you must release the thumbstick and then move it again to rotate again, it doesn't rotate additional steps if you hold the thumbstick in position.

New (Rift) players will have this option enabled by default, whereas existing players must set it themselves (to avoid confusion for players who don't see this announcement).

If you experience any bugs or problems with this latest version, or with the game in general, please report them in the group discussions (or comment on this post) and I'll try and address them as quickly as possible!